Gay marriage and the Follower of Jesus

I am quite surprised I have not heard a cry about it. But then again, I haven’t been listening to much mainstream Christian talk radio lately.

A week or two ago, President Barack Obama declared his support for same-sex marriage. That didn’t surprise me.

It really doesn’t bother me either.

I know that last statement will cause some to think that I am a heretic, abandoned the faith, and may even be the devil incarnate. How could it not bother me? How could I just watch our country slide from “Christian” values? Well, in light of what is portrayed in the scriptures, are we supposed to be concerned about it? If so, why?

Of course, I do not condone homosexuality or gay marriage. Having sex with the same gender is sin, plain and simple. I really don’t have to quote a bunch of scriptures to point that out. There are plenty of other places on the internet to find that out. It is not a matter of trying to find out if it is sin or not. That is also not the point of this post.

The major thing that I was thinking about was the backlash of Christian “leaders” going crazy about what Mr. Obama said. I have had my fill over the years of especially hearing Christian talk radio programs telling us we need to get with our elected officials to either get our laws changed or keep them from changing. “We need to overturn Roe v. Wade”, “We need to get a constitutional amendment to make marriage one man and one woman”, “We need to have children be able to pray in school”, and on and on it goes. However, is that what our purpose is?

When I got to thinking about all of this, I posted this on my Facebook status:

If we are pilgrims on this earth awaiting a home “whose builder and maker is God”, why do we cry about and try to change the laws of the natives of this world because they’re “taking away our Christian rights”?

Why do we expect the world to be different than what is portrayed in the Scriptures?

Why are we so afraid of the world HATING us when that is what Jesus said would (and should) happen?

Jesus calls us to follow HIM, not politics or laws that will make your life easier. Our life does not hinge on whether gay marriage, abortion, or other sin is legal or not. God will deal with that in the end.

The world is a slave to sin.They do not know Christ. You should expect them to sin. But you, if you follow Christ, live like it. Walk in His righteousness and preach the gospel, not getting caught up in foolish arguments and opinions.

(I have a lot I could say here. I guess I may just divide what I am saying into a few different posts. My last post was pretty long and some people don’t want to sit and read one post for 15 minutes. I am kind of new to this blogging thing so have patience with me. I want to make my points with what God teaches us in His Word, not with my opinions.)

The summary of all of this is that we are considered foreigners on this earth. This is not our home. Scripture makes it clear that when we are Christ’s, we are not of this kingdom, but of the one to come. Our King has made His own rules that supersede any rule on earth.

This world is a slave to sin. We should know that by seeing it constantly rebel against God. We should know it because we were once living according to its principles. We, lastly, should know it because we live in this cursed flesh that wants to rebel against God.

If we live in a world that is bent on rebellion against God, why do we get all bent out of shape over it wanting to sin? Yes, our government condones many sins though its laws, but we are not called to try to make the people of this world behave or change the laws to make it more comfortable for us. What we ARE called to do is to preach the truth of gospel in love so that God may change their hearts. If God changes hearts, then it will be evidenced though righteous living. If all we do is try to change laws or argue our opinion that something is right or not, hearts are not being changed.

We do not have any record of Jesus preaching against the sins of the Roman Empire that ruled over Israel in that day. He instead preached against the sins in our own hearts. He preached about what our priorities should be…the Kingdom of God and being a servant that the King Eternal.

We do not have any record of Paul telling believers in any of the churches he wrote to that they need to picket and petition the Roman government to ban certain things they didn’t agree with. Paul spoke to them about living the way they needed to live to glorify God, even if it meant being killed for your faith.

I am not saying we shouldn’t care about abortion, homosexuality, greed, theft, adultery, murder, lying, or any other sin the government, or anybody living on this earth, might condone. If you don’t like where the country is going, you have a right to fire the elected officials that are in office during the elections. But, this world will sin. We should expect it. It will probably get worse.

If homosexuality becomes the norm, so what? What about other sins? Why is gossip, lying, hated, sex outside of marriage, frivolous divorce, and many other sins not given the same treatment? I guess because the other sins touch our own lives and we don’t want to deal with those.

Don’t get carried away with trying to keep your “rights”. You don’t have rights. You are a foreigner. We don’t live in a “Christian nation” or world. We live in a world that needs to hear the truth, not a bunch of Christians crying because things aren’t going their way. If that is what they see, they will have nothing to do with Christ since His followers are a bunch of cry babies.

“Do not set you mind on things earth, but on things above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God.” (Col 3:1-2)

11 responses

I love this. It’s what I was thinking once I heard that Obama supported gay marriage. I know one day it will be legalized all over, and you know what I’m going to do? The same thing I’ve always been doing: follow Jesus, not the norms of the world. Good post and good inspiration.

So much of these people being focused on changing the world and not changing themselves and looking towards the future as a citizen of the Heavenly Kingdom comes out, too. In this issue it especially comes out in the hypocrisy they hold in their campaigns. The homosexuals call them out on this, too, quite correctly.
The fact is, they redefined marriage first, rendering what is God’s up to Caesar. The homosexuals are only lining up and saying that they get to do the same.

The answer for them is to stop looking to Caesar with the matter, repent in sackcloth and ashes for what they have done to destroy the sanctity of marriage, and enforce Marriage 1.0 completely and totally down the line.

The only time I ever get heated is when other Christians try to say that God is ok with homosexuality. Otherwise I just don’t give a rip. I care, to a degree…as much as I care about any other sin running rampant, but why panic and freak out about it? I got in an argument on facebook with another Christian because he said that being gay wasn’t sinful. Well, yes…it is. So that is where my heated arguments usually go to. I just ignore the rest. Why throw a tizzy about something I can’t control and is supposed to happen? I have bigger fish to fry.

That seems to be the other side of the coin. On one side, many Christians freak out about it and practically reject homosexuals in everything. On the other side are those that embrace it as something God has somehow condoned. Huh? How does that work besides picking and choosing what we want to agree with from God’s Word? You can only do so much but sometimes you just just have to let them go their merry way in the delusion they are in.

All have sinned and fall short of the Glory of God. That includes me, so I can’t get on my high horse and look down on “those wicked people”. Jesus died once for all, to reconcile man to God, and if that includes me, then it includes everyone else who falls into the category of the ‘all’ who have sinned, so just like me “those wicked people” need Jesus atoning death. But for Jesus death to have any value for us, we need to believe, be baptised and follow Him. If we do not allow Jesus to have any claim on my life, then what need do I have to do what He tells me. What we need to do is to love the sinner, but hate the sin. It sounds easy but in reality it is difficult, and to be honest, the more doctrinally correct a church fellowship is, the less likely its members are to demonstrate that love. In essence each church fellowship tolerates sin in its membership, but different churches tolerate different sins. What we need to be is intolerant of all sin, or holy, just as Jesus is holy, and loving as Jesus was loving (think Rich young ruler or Martha as she was throwing a tantrum about her sister)

I am not saying we shouldn’t care about abortion, homosexuality, greed, theft, adultery, murder, lying, or any other sin the government, or anybody living on this earth, might condone. If you don’t like where the country is going, you have a right to fire the elected officials that are in office during the elections. But, this world will sin. We should expect it. It will probably get worse.

If homosexuality becomes the norm, so what? What about other sins? Why is gossip, lying, hated, sex outside of marriage, frivolous divorce, and many other sins not given the same treatment? I guess because the other sins touch our own lives and we don’t want to deal with those.

Don’t get carried away with trying to keep your “rights”. You don’t have rights.

[…] seem common among Christianity. Many of those questions I have dealt with on this blog including the common Christian attitude toward gay marriage, making issues from the Bible that aren’t really there, making ourselves look better than we […]